Two other important things that also happened on this day

September 19, 2007

Scott Fahlman, a professor at Carnegie Mellon, says he was the first to use the symbol in something he published on Sept. 19, 1982. “I propose the following character sequence for joke markers :-),” he wrote at the time. “Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark things that are not jokes, given current trends. For this, use :-(.”